Faith Applied
By A. Gene Veal

We have observed that “THE OBEDIENCE OF FAITH” includes the idea of hearing, listening, or harkening.  “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”  If you don’t “hear” you can’t be obedient, but we also see that the process of obedience is “faith.”  For “without faith it is impossible to please Him.”  And “THE RIGHTEOUS [man] SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.”

But what does all of this mean in practical application to our everyday life?  How do I live with the facts that I know to be true about myself?  What do I say when the accuser whispers, “You call yourself a Christian?  Would a Christian think those thoughts or do those things?  How could you be a Christian if you still have problems with impure thoughts or actions?”

You will have to choose between what you “see” in your flesh and what you are told about yourself as a Christian in the Scriptures.  As in the case of the Father of faith, Abraham, “calls those things which do not exist as though they did.”  “For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?”  “So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”

So let’s get it clear at the start: YOUR LIFE AS A CHRISTIAN IS GOING TO BE BY FAITH FROM FIRST TO LAST.  We will not know the joy of the Christian life apart from faith, “fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith.”  You have been declared righteous in Christ, but this righteousness is “a righteousness that is by faith from first to last.”  You don’t just come to God by faith, get saved, and now get on with living the Christian life as best you can.  No!  What was begun by faith (salvation) will be led on in faith (the Christian life).  For if “we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!”  His death for our sin was on the Cross.  His resurrected life is in us right now.  “He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.”

We do not serve an historical Christ, which is suggested by the well-intended WWJD (What would Jesus do?).  We serve the LIVING LORD Who is right now alive in us. (Better to say, What WILL Jesus do?)   “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.”

I believe the best way to apply this using one block of connected Scripture would be to look at 2Peter 1.  If we just understand what is said in this chapter, instead of being burdened by our inadequacies and failures, we will be encouraged by His sufficiency in every aspect of our life.  There is nothing we lack.  According to this text “His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness.”  We do not need to acquire more of this or that; rather, we need to DISCOVER WHAT IS OURS IN CHRIST RIGHT NOW.  And then appropriate it BY FAITH.

Look at what Peter tells us:  “Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.  For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.”

Now, these verses are so FULL.  Read them again prayerfully that the “Spirit of Truth“ may impart His meaning to you.  Without divine revelation there will be no understanding.  Recognize that this will not be clear to you simply by intellectual pursuit.  Divine Truth must be divinely revealed.  So pray His will be done in that  “you might become partakers of the divine nature.”  And this will be by faith in “His precious and magnificent promises.”  If you will “hear” Him, you will have faith, for “faith cometh by hearing.”  Now let us move on into the text.

Peter says he is writing to people “who have received a faith of the same kind as ours.”  While it is true that we do not all possess the same measure of faith (“think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you”), we all have the “same kind” of faith.  To sit in a chair expecting it to support you, flip a switch expecting the lights to come on, turn on a faucet with faith that water will pour out, etc. is a kind of faith, but it is not this faith.  This faith is “given you” and it comes from “hearing the word.”  If you are a Christian, you have “this faith.”  It is the same faith Peter had.

It is only “by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.”  Everything that is ours in Christ is by His righteousness.  You cannot merit a thing.  The works you do are by His righteousness.  Your access to the Throne of Grace is by His righteousness.  Your observance of the Lord’s Supper is by His righteousness.  Your righteousness as a Christian is “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.”  Jesus is our righteousness before God, for “by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.”

Notice that the way grace and peace are multiplied to us is “in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.”  He says in the last chapter and verse of this epistle, “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”  Grow in grace?  Why didn’t he say to grow in merit? The common understanding of grace is “unmerited favor”.  If you grow in unmerited favor, you will be calling on Him for that which you DO NOT merit.  You will grow down, not up. 

You will grow in the awareness of your weakness like Paul said, “He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me.  Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”  When we “grow in grace”, we come to know our weakness and when we grow in “knowledge of our Lord”, we come to know His strength within us.

The reason “the knowledge of our Lord” is a means of grace and peace, Peter says, is because by that knowledge (intimacy with Him) we will begin to see “that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness.”  We lack nothing but discovery.  I liken it to a workshop that has every tool necessary to build a table.  As I begin the project, I discover I need a power saw.  Looking in the workshop, there it is.  And the saw is powered by something other than me and the Spirit within me applies the tool perfectly as I yield it all to His control.  As I proceed with the project I may discover I need a sander.  I look in the workshop and there it is.  And so it goes.  (You can also apply this illustration to verses 5-9.)

In Christ we have “everything pertaining to life and godliness”, but this will only be realized in our life “BY FAITH.”  Remember, this is only “through the true knowledge of Him who called us.”  In you desire to KNOW HIM you cannot search the Scriptures too much.  You cannot pray too much to know Him better.  This knowledge is an intimacy with Him of which you can not over do. 

This is what Paul said, “I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, of perceiving and recognizing and understanding Him more fully and clearly. (Not the knowledge of doctrines about Him as much as knowing HIM.)

“For His sake I have lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in order that I may win (gain) Christ and that I may actually be found and known as in Him, not having any self-achieved righteousness that can be called my own, based on my obedience to the Law's demands (ritualistic uprightness and supposed right standing with God thus acquired), but possessing that genuine righteousness which comes through faith in Christ, which comes from God by faith.

“For my determined purpose is that I may know Him, that I may progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and more clearly, and that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection which it exerts over believers, and that I may so share His sufferings as to be continually transformed in spirit into His likeness even to His death, in the hope that if possible I may attain to the spiritual and moral resurrection that lifts me out from among the dead even while in the body.”

Do you see the emphasis?  It is KNOWING HIM, a deep and intimate knowing.  Why?  It is because the Christian life is impossible to live.  Do you think YOU can live this life?  Have you not discovered the best you can accomplish is a roller coaster experience of ups and downs?  At best you can only pretend to be the Christian you are “supposed” to be.  Stop that now.  Knowing Him is the answer to living the Christian life.  An intimacy with Him will produce in you the fragrance of Christ.  “For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.”  HE MUST LIVE HIS LIFE THROUGH YOU.  “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

How then do we “become partakers of the divine nature”?  Peter says, It is “by them”, that is by “His precious and magnificent promises”.  What does that require?  FAITH.  We must first know the promises and then we must believe them.  If you look at yourself apart from who you are in Christ, you will be disappointed every time.  Stop examining your performance in the flesh.  You will always come up short.  When have you ever had an absolutely pure motive?  Paul said, “In fact, I do not even judge myself.”

One of the best illustrations from Scripture that will suggest what we are seeing in this text would be found in 2Samuel 9.  Do you know the story of Mephibosheth?  He was lame in both feet because of another’s fall.  When he was five years old, his nurse fell while fleeing with him in her arms.  Consequently, he was lame in both feet for the rest of his life.

David said, “Is there not still someone of the house of Saul to whom I may show the [unfailing, unsought, unlimited] mercy and kindness of God?”  David having come to the throne as king, by all rights should have destroyed Mephibosheth so that there would not be a threat to his kingship by someone of the house of the previous king, Saul.  However, because of David’s love for Saul’s son, Jonathan (who died in battle at the same time Saul died), David wanted to show kindness to someone of Saul’s household for the sake of Jonathan.

“David said to him, Fear not, for I will surely show you kindness for Jonathan your father's sake, and will restore to you all the land of Saul your grandfather, and you shall eat at my table always.”  Mephibosheth was promised he could live in the palace with King David and would receive provisions for the rest of his life.  He was promised he could sit at the King’s table as one of the son’s of the King.

However, the Scripture is quick to point out that Mephibosheth was still lame in both feet.  That was the equivalent in that day of being completely helpless and worthless.  The Scripture tells us, “he ate continually at the king's table, even though he was lame in both feet.”  In other words, sitting at a table you might not be able to tell that he was lame in both feet, but any other time it would be quite evident.  Can you imagine the continual problem he had being reminded every time he awoke to start his day, “I am still lame in both feet.  Do I really have the right to go downstairs to eat with the sons of the King?  I am supposed to be dead.  How do I know I won’t be killed?  How can I have peace at the table of the perfect (those who seem to have more right than I have to eat at the King’s table)?  I don’t feel like a son of the King.  I don’t look like it.  They are so familiar with procedures and I don’t even know the correct fork to use.  Some of them don’t treat me like I am the son of a King.  How can I live this life and do it right?

There you are.  Every morning you awaken, you are reminded that you are still flesh and blood.  The constant awareness of your lameness is brought up to you every day and though out every day.  Time after time you have thoughts and responses that are not the way a child of God should think or respond.  Many times you do what a child of God should not do.  You want to do right, but how to do it is just beyond your lameness.  What will you do?  (This is described in Romans 7, “For we know that the Law is spiritual; but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin.  For that which I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.  But if I do the very thing I do not wish to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that it is good.  So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which indwells me (my lameness).

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh (my lameness); for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.  For the good that I wish, I do not do; but I practice the very evil that I do not wish.  But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin (my lameness) which dwells in me.”)

This means that you will have to do what Mephibosheth had to do every day: BELIEVE THE PROMISES OF THE KING.  If Mephibosheth is going to examine himself apart from what the king has promised him, he will live in fear, dread, and failure.  That would be much like the average Christian, would it not? 

You, too, must believe what the King tells you.  For example:

“Now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.”

“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

“It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God-- that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.”

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

“And if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.”

“And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son.”

“What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?  He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?  Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.”

“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.”  (You may want to read our series on THE RIGHTEOUS.)

No, it may not look like it.  We may not feel like it.  Others may tell us it isn’t so, but if you “let God be true but every man a liar”, you will succeed in your Christian walk by “His precious and magnificent promises, in order that by them you might become partakers of the divine nature.”

You must stay in the Word.  Live FROM who you are and stop trying to BECOME the you He has already declared you to be.  Stop reading the Bible as if it is an invoice you must pay and start reading it as a bank account that Father has given you and draw on it.  Embrace the invisible and know the REALITY and “you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

(You may want to read our next article: ESCAPING CORRUPTION.)

Click here to read SCRIPTURE COUNSEL ON FAITH

Click here to read THE OBEDIENCE OF FAITH

Click here to read OBEDIENCE DEFINED

Click here to read series on THE RIGHTEOUS

Click here to read about GRACE